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Meet the Nigerian startup looking to take on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram

Meet Birthday Mates, the new niche social networking website that just launched in September 2015.

Kanayo Okwuraiwe, founder, Birthday-Mates.com

No. They are not looking to compete with Twitter and co. They are just saying they think they can be bigger (in terms of membership) than the aforementioned sites, and perhaps for good reason.

Meet Birthday-Mates.com, the new niche social networking website that just launched in September 2015.

When you consider that their target audience is everyone on planet earth who has a birthday. All 7 billion of us. Or at least everyone with an internet connected device, it is easy to understand why they can be so optimistic. Or is it bold?

Among other things, the site groups people who share a similar birthday—usually within 1 - 3 weeks of each other, allows these ‘Birthday Mates’ exchange gifts with each other and get gifts from family and friends on their birthday, have joint/group birthday celebrations (those in the same Geo location,) create crowdfunding campaigns for birthday gifts, parties, or other birthday related projects, and much more.

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The site and concept was conceived by Nigerian-born South African resident, Kanayo Okwuraiwe.

But why exactly does Kanayo think Birthday Mates can be bigger than the likes of Twitter, Instagram and co? Is there some secret he knows about growing a site’s membership to over 400 million (Twitter’s claimed membership) that thousands of other sites do not know?

“Well, first and foremost, by working harder. Secondly working smarter. Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, I think the niche I’m in makes my site somewhat unique. Unique because everyone has a birthday. And while not everyone is big on celebrating their birthdays, or getting gifts, or making any fuss about it, I imagine that this number is in the greater minority, leaving a vast amount of people open to being my target audience. So I’m talking billions,” Okwuraiwe says, speaking exclusively to Pulse Tech.

“And by the way, even when this tiny minority are not big on birthdays, chances are their closest family members are often able to rope them into the birthday celebratory mode one way or another. I am a classic example,” he adds.

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According to Okwuraiwe, there’s the fact that while certain people prefer and are more active on Twitter, others are more on Facebook, others yet on Instagram, or LinkedIn, and so on.

“The point is, my target audience won’t necessarily need to prefer my site over another. All they need to do is sign up on the website, get matched to their Birthday Mates, and they can forget about us. And can choose not to visit our site again,” says Okwuraiwe.

Until their birthday comes around, and we get in touch asking them what gifts they would like to get on their birthday, perhaps because several of our sponsors are giving out gifts for our members’ birthday, or if they are interested in joining 5 or 10 other people (Birthday Mates) to celebrate or just hang out on their birthday, or whatever the case may be,” he adds.

These, and more is why Okwuraiwe thinks the site’s membership will swell beyond those of all the other social networking sites.

It’ll be interesting to see how this startup grows and the scope to which the company can expand its operations and services.

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